Marathon Pace (I Hope)

So this past weekend was the Chicago Distance Classic in, as the name hints at, Chicago! Last year, I feel like this race was the pinnacle of my training for the year. I trained all summer putting in lots of hundred mile weeks, but didn't really race anything over a 5K until this race. At this race, I ran a 1:14:41, which was a PR by about 3 minutes. A few weeks prior to this race, my mom was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer (it still hurts to write that), which pretty much sent my training into the crapper, and I feel like every race after this one was done on just pure residual effect from the great training I was able to do up to this point. But for this one race last year, I was in top form.

This year, things are different. While I wouldn't call my summer exactly stellar, it hasn't been bad. Even with last weeks meager totals, I'm still averaging 70 miles per week for the year (70.2 actually, but who's counting), while last year I think I was closer to 80 miles per week. There is probably a little more quality to the miles I'm doing this year as well, which definitely counts for something. I also think that since this is the second year of running higher mileage, the cumulative effect of all those miles is still paying dividends for me. So I still think I have a great opportunity to run a great race in the marathon this year. What I need to do to make that happen is to focus on these next 8 weeks to make sure that I put myself in the best position to succeed. Switching back to morning runs is one step in that process.

This morning was my longer tempo run where I try and run around marathon pace. This is the third week that I've been incorporating this run into my schedule and I think I'm starting to get some idea of what a 5:50-5:55 pace should feel like. I still hesitate to say that is what my marathon pace is going to be (it sounds a little intimidating at this point), but I guess at some point you need to pick a time and go with it. The way this run works is I do about a 2 mile warm-up and then I start with about a half mile of winding trails that lead me to a two mile loop that I do 3 times and then head back on the half mile trail. The run is done exclusively on a gravel path, so while I do save a little pounding on the legs, I really don't like running fast on gravel. It gets in my shoes and I just don’t feel fast on it. There. My daily wine is out of the way.

The run went good today. I try not to check my watch too often during my runs so I can get some sort of self-pacing going on. For the first loop of this run, I was really just focusing on staying comfortable. I seemed to hit this goal and still came through the 2.5 mile mark at a 5:55 overall pace. My breathing became a little more labored as I went to work on the second loop. I wasn't sure if this was because I was subconsciencly upping the pace, or if the 5:55 was getting to me. However, when I came to the end of loop 2, I had worked the pace down to 5:50, which confirmed that the increase in effort did coincide with an increase in pace as well. The last lap I kept that overall pace at 5:50, and that's also where I wound up at the end of the 7 miles. The last half mile was tough, probably more because mentally, I was thinking of the run as 3 loops, so when I completed the 3rd loop, I wanted to be done! I finished the run with a slow mile back to my house for 10 miles total for the day.

I was hoping to get out for a slow 7 miler at lunch today, but the boss had other plans, so I'll probably just bag it. With 17 on tap for tomorrow morning, I don't want to jeopardize the quality of that run for a recovery run.